Anonymous Blog

It took a lot for me to write about these wind turbines because I am a farmer. I am also a farmer who, in the beginning, was signing up for some of them back in 2008 and 2009. Well, I didn’t sign back up for another five year lease because these fellas are something. I was offered $8,000 a turbine at first which would be a fair chunk of change compared to a bushel of corn. So I waited and told them I would think about it. I tried to do some searching on the company but I never had the time I guess. They did come back though and offered $9,000 a turbine which I signed for and regret now I was in the same pen with.

Now if you listen, since then I found out my neighbor waited longer than me and got almost $11,000. Hmmm, I said, I wonder why? The wind corporations cannot use right of ways and they have to go across farm ground. Well, they never told me that. They also don’t tell you a lot of things like how my good neighbor’s house will get flying shadows all over it when he is home from work. They also do not say anything about the time it will take them to fix drainage issues caused by their towers.

I was a trusting fella like most of us are but I feel like I should have done as much homework before signing on to them. I spent more time trying to find a penny more a bushel than I did on these 500 foot towers. I’ll admit it, I was stupid so I never re-upped.

Like my grandpa used to say out in the pasture when I was little…”Better watch your step.”

I was thinking about some of my good friends who have contracted with the wind corporations to lease their ground. It seems to me this information would do anyone some good who has or who is thinking about doing this. Remember, Invenergy promised that the Hardin County Commissioners had to "move fast" to get this opportunity. This way, the wind turbines would be erected by the end on 2010. Hmmmm, these guys wouldn't have lied would they?To lease your ground please remember:

You can say where they go in relationship of making them more distantfrom your neighbors

Land owners who hold out the longest get the most money

Specify how long is allowed to fix drainage and tile problems...they happen everywhere else there are turbines and they will happen to you.

Also, the land owners has a full house for a hand in this poker game before they are up and after they are up the land owner isn't even dealt into the game.

Everyone knows I am a huge supporter of renewable energy. I think it is a great idea. I really do that is why I have become so critical of what is happening around our homes. These wind turbines were designed to be miles off the coast of a country’s shores. That is what they were designed for and that is where they should be placed. Well, needless to say the original intent has been corrupted to the point where wind power is getting the reputation that it is in-effective. Wind power is not it is their placement and their design are being wrongly placed.

Think of it this way, if you had bad breath you wouldn’t use an enema for a cure. They are not made for that so either should these turbines be close to homes.

I was once in favor of green energy. I have already stated this previously. It seemed like a wonderful alternative to the status quo. Mr. Al Gore said that it would be cheaper, better, and more plentiful than fossil fuels. Do you remember these comments?

Well, as it turns out it actually is! The Big Wind Corporations get low/no interest loans from the federal government, thus making it cheap… cheap for them and more expensive when we, the consumer, is forced to buy it. How high has your electric bill risen in the last eight years? Our homes use less electricity now than they used to and we pay more.

Paying? We pay high taxes so corporations can get cheap loans. These wind corporations, often owned by foreigners, then build inside of neighborhoods. As a result of these corporate zones, they lower home and property values

Higher electric bills, higher taxes, and lower property values… I would say only in America but we are now discovering from Europe and England that they have already been through this.

Forbes magazine ran an article relating how wind turbine sites can reduce a home's value by 20% or more. Wow! I find that hard to believe when every wind corporation says that they do not. Why would the findings in the independent research want to lie?

My question is do we really need a study to tell us, Americans, that when someone erects a three hundred foot tower with 200 foot blades that spin next to a home, the value of that home goes down?

I am the biggest proponent of environmentally friendly power generation. However, wind turbines are not environmentally friendly if you like birds, bats, and endangered species...not to mention endangering your neighbors.

It seems odd to me that my neighbors who farm and are very smart people may have been duped into poor agreements with the wind corporations. In fact, I believe many probably spend more time reading the grain market reports than their own lease agreements.

For example, there is a paragraph addressing damage to tile and drainage. However, it never states how it is to be addressed and how long it will take to fix the problem. In other states, it seems to return from the wind corporations a matter which was “pre-existing." So where does one turn to fix the tile and who eats the cost?

Another example, since the farmer receives a percentage of the profit from the turbine in his signed contact it never states how that “profit” is determined. Weird how the wind corporations never offer the farmer a portion of the carbon tax credit money.

I wanted to start an open discussion concerning these wind corporations who are wanting to surround our homes. I was once a person who fully wanted wind energy. Sounds hard to believe so I wanted to explain to you all while we all can still hear before they are potentially up.

My opinion has drastically changed after studying the issue from 2009 until now. The history, when studied, can reveal much concerning the truth. Does wind energy create electric? Yes. Were they designed with neighborhoods in mind? No. The turbines were designed to set off shore of the main land and not intermixed with family homes. This was where and when I parted company and no longer supported them. Much like cigarettes, they were not manufactured for children to smoke nor would anyone with common sense wish to change that purpose.

So why did they move in land and why have they reared their head in America? The rest of the world have moved away from this idea of wind generation for two very important reasons; the first is they do not generate anywhere near what their promoters claimed and the second reason they are not cost effective.

It seems odd to me that common sense does not play a more prominent role when dealing with these wind promoters. I would like to remind people of a good, old adage. “He who wants to dance should pay the fiddler.”

Well, the wind companies want to dance, they want the tax payer to pay the fiddler, and now want the county to pay for the dance hall and its up keep.